Category: Quick Film News

Kathy Bates, John Carroll Lynch, Kim Dickens, Thomas Mann and William Sadler have joined the cast of Highwaymen, the crime drama that John Lee Hancock is directing, with Kevin Costner and Woody Harrelson in the lead roles. The film is currently filming in Louisiana. Based on the true events of Texas Ranger Frank Hamer and ex-partner Maney Gault, who...

Michael Fassbender has joined the cast of Kung Fury, the sequel to David Sandberg’s short. The action comedy, which will also star David Hasselhoff, is set in 1985’s Miami, which is kept safe under the watchful eye of the police officer Kung Fury through his Thundercops police force. After the tragic death of a Thundercop causes the group to...

Studio 8 has acquired the rights to A Most Dangerous Man, based on the true story of Otto Skorzeny, a high ranking Nazi special forces soldier and Hitler confidant who was known by the Allies as “the most dangerous man in Europe”. After the war, Skorzeny was relocated and recruited by an intrepid Mossad agent to work...

MGM has acquired Fairy Godmother, a spec script by Chiara Atik, a playwright, writer and blogger. Helen Estabrook (“Whiplash”) will produce. The story is a comic revisionist take at the classic fairy-tale.

Eva Longoria, Jeremy Piven and Jessica Szohr have joined the cast of All-Star Weekend, Jamie Foxx’s directing debut. Foxx has also written the screenplay and will star. The project started filming Oct. 26 and will center on two tow-truck drivers, Malik (Foxx), and Danny (Piven), who are basketball fanatics and would take a bullet for their respective...

Shawn Levy is set to direct Uncharted for Sony Pictures. The feature film based on the PlayStation video game series featuring the treasure hunter Nathan Drake, is in development for years at the studio, and Levy is the latest director to board the project after Neil Burger and recently Joe Carnahan.

Paramount Pictures has acquired the rights to a series of novels by Ted Bell, focusing on British MI6 agent Sir Alexander Hawke. Kurt Wimmer (“Salt”) is set to write the screenplay and Lorenzo di Bonaventura will produce.

Nat Wolff and Alexander Skarsgard have signed on to star in the feature film adaptation of Dan Krauss‘ war documentary The Kill Team. Krauss will direct from his own screenplay. The story follows Private Adam Winfield, a soldier in Afghanistan who attempted to blow the whistle on members of his platoon who carry out a murderous...

Christian Rivers will direct the film adaptation of the popular book series Mortal Engines. Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, who have developed the projects for years, set it at MRC and Universal Pictures. The screenplay has been written by Jackson, Walsh and Philippa Boyens. The film is set to start filming next spring in New Zealand.

Margot Robbie has joined the voice cast of Peter Rabbit, Columbia’s adaptation of Beatrix Potter’s classic children book. Will Gluck is set to direct, with Domhnall Gleeson and Rose Byrne playing the live-action roles. James Corden will voice Peter.

Studio 8 has acquired the rights to Scout, a 1980s comic book actioner. Chris MacBride is set to direct from his own screenplay. The story follows an Apache ex-Army Ranger who, while on a personal/spiritual mission, investigates the disappearance of young women and in the process uncovers a far-reaching conspiracy involving local gangs, human slavers, oil...

Tim Miller (“Deadpool”) has dropped out of directing the sequel, because of creative differences with star Ryan Reynolds. Miller’s involvement was announced back in April during CinemaCon. He was in the process of developing the script

Danny Glover has joined the cast of the untitled Han Solo film, confirming that he will play the role of young Lado Calrissian. Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are directing the spinoff Star Wars movie that is set to be released in May 2018.

Paramount has picked up the rights to Escape, an action-adventure about a group tech-savvy criminals who are recruited on mission. Tze Chun (Tv’s “Once Upon a Time”) has written the screenplay. Chu Studios are producing.

Martin Freeman has joined the cast of Captain America: Civil War, the next installment of the Marvel franchise that is set to be released next May. He will be playing a still unnamed character. Filming is currently underway.

Billy Crudup will star opposite Frank Langella in Youth in Oregon, a dark comedy to be directed by Joel David Moore. Crudup will play a husband on a cross-country trip to Oregon with his cantankerous father-in-law (Langella), a man who has given up on life. He must convince his father-in-law not to commit euthanasia when they...

Marcus Nispel is developing a new horror thriller, based on a Nordic myth of a seaborne humanoid avenging creature. Stowaway is about a newly engaged woman who hits the high seas with the seemingly perfect family into which she is marrying. Things go south then she discovers that at the bottom of the ocean lies a...

Cary Fukunaga is set to direct a movie based on the true story of Joe and Jadin Bell. Jadin Bell was an openly gay 15-year-old who took his own life after being bullied at school and struggling for acceptance from the people closest to him. His father, Joe, attempted to work through his grief over his...

Screenwriters Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese (“Zombieland”) have optioned the rights to The Real Coke, The Real Story, the Thomas Oliver book about the disastrous launch of New Coke. Oliver was the business reporter for the Atlanta Journal Constitution who covered Coca-Cola closely when the so-called improved formula was introduced and summarily rejected by Coke drinkers....

UFC fighter, Ronda Rousey has signed on to star in the action movie Mile 22, which Peter Berg is producing. Iko Uwais (“The Raid”) will also star. The film explores the relationship between a CIA field officer and an Indonesian police officer, forced to work together as they confront violent and extreme political corruption. Shooting is...

Paramount is in talks to acquire the rights to the feature-film adaptation of The Stars My Destination, a classic sci-novel by Alfred Bester. The story follows a man who is shipwrecked in space for years when one day a rescue crew passes him by. Angered, he channels his energies into seeking revenge and begins scheming. Mary...

Kristen Stewart has joined the ensemble cast of Kelly Reichardt’s new drama, a series of vignettes that revolve around the lives of people in small-town Montana. Michelle Williams and Laura Dern will also star. Stewart will play a young lawyer from Boise who takes a teaching job several hours from her house. Despite her nerves about...

Josh Duhamel and Ernie Hudson have signed on to co-star in The Wrong Stuff, a sports drama that Brett Rapkin is directing from his own script. Based on Bill Lee’s and Richard Lally’s memoir, the story chronicles the downward spiral of Major League pitcher Lee, a hot-tempered, self-serving madman unable to see himself as anything other...

Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber are reuniting to write the adaptation of Looking for Alaska, John Green’s first novel. The screenwriting duo previously worked together on the successful adaptation of Green’s Fault in our Stars. Watermark Pictures is producing and Paramount is distributing.

Yann Demange (“’71”) has signed on to direct an untitled dramatic thriller for New Regency Productions and Plan B. The script is written by his ’71 screenwriter, Gregory Burke. 20th Century Fox will distribute.

Affirm Films and Mass Hysteria Entertainment have acquired the rights to The Devil in Pew Number Seven, a memoir by Rebecca Nichols Alonzo with Bob DeMoss. The book recounts Alonzo’s story of losing her parents when they stood up against evil within their church — a man obsessed with controlling the congregation who was determined to...

Blake Lively and Jason Clarke have signed on to star in the romantic drama All I See Is You. Marc Forster is directing and has co-written the screenplay with Sean Conway. The story follows a blind woman who regains her sight. She then begins to discover, along with her husband, previously unseen and disturbing details about...

Simon West (“The Expendables 2”) has come on board to direct action-thriller Stratton for Amber Entertainment, Promethean Productions and GFM. The film, which will star Henry Cavill, is based on the first of a series of eight novels by Duncan Falconer following a Special Boat Service operative tracking down an international terrorist cell through Central Asia,...

Warner Bros has come on board to reboot Tomb Raider, taking over from MGM, which will produce with GK Films. Evan Daugherty (“Snow White and the Huntsman”) will write a new draft for the screenplay. The franchise had two films released in 2001 and 2003, both starring Angelina Jolie.

Jerry Lewis will make a rare appearance in a Hollywood movie, by joining the cast of The Trust, a crime drama that is starring Nicolas Cage and Elijah Wood. Alex and Ben Brewer are directing from a script by Ben Brewer, Adam Hirsch. The story follows two corrupt cops who are stuck working the evidence room...

Kellan Lutz and Gina Carano have joined the cast of Extraction, the spy thriller that has Bruce Willis starring and Steven C. Miller directing. The story follows a former CIA operative who is kidnapped by a group of terrorist. When his son, CIA rookie Harry Turner, learns there is no plan for his father to be...

Alexander Dinelaris (“Birdman”) has signed on to exec-produce and write the inspirational sports drama The Year of the Monarchs. Inspired by elements of his own life, the story of a father and daughter who struggle to make ends meet in their dying hometown. Things have gotten so bad that the baseball team’s beloved iconic announcer has...

Terry Rossio (“Pirates of the Caribbean”) has been set to write Yucatan, a potential starring vehicle for Robert Downey, Jr. that Warner Bros and Team Downey are developing. Based on the 1700-page treatment written by actor Steve McQueen in the late 1960s, the story follows a renegade salvage expert’s search for Mayan treasure in the Yucatan...

Sanaa Lathan (“The Best Man”) has joined the cast of Now You See Me 2, Summit Entertainment’s sequel to last year’s hit. The sequel follows the magician troupe, the Four Horseman, a year later as they become embroiled in a new dangerous heist spearheaded by a new enemy. Lathan will portray play FBI agent Natalie Austin....

Mark Kassen (“Puncture”) has signed on to direct and produce the crime comedy Criminal Empire for Dummies. He will also produce with Gremi Films and Cutting Edge Group. The story follows a hustler who rises to the top of the crime underworld by using his own gangster lessons. Cliff Dorfman (“Warrior”) will write the screenplay. Filming...

Oliver Platt, Molly Parker, Barbara Hershey and Aiden Longworth have joined the cast of the supernatural thriller The 9th Life of Louis Drax. Jamie Dornan, Aaron Paul and Sarah Gadon star. Alexandre Aja is directing the film for Miramax, AntColony Films and Brightlight Pictures. The story, based on Liz Jensen’s novel, centers on Louis Drax who suffers...

Chiwetel Ejiofor has joined the growing ensemble of The Martian, the sci-fi epic that Ridley Scott is set to direct with Matt Damon starring. The story follows an astronaut marooned on Mars. Ejiofor will portray Venkat Kapoor, the Director of the Mars Mission.

Kiernan Shipka will star in teen comedy Fan Girl, about a 15-year-old post-Millennial teen who lives for making movies and idolizing her favorite band. Given only a few days to complete a final film project, she comes up with an idea that could bring her two passions together. Meg Ryan has also signed on to star,...

Fox 2000 Pictures has acquired the rights for the big screen adaptation of What the Dinosaurs Did Last Night, an upcoming book by Refe and Susan Tuma. In order to entertain their children, the Tumas began staging toy dinosaurs in elaborate scenes in their home, wrecking bathrooms, destroying vases and encountering terrifying hot irons. They then...

Kim Basinger has joined the cast of The Nice Guys, the period noir thriller that will star Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe. Matt Bomer, Beau Knapp and Keith David also recently joined the Warner Bros project, that Shane Black is directing. The story, set in 1970s Los Angeles, follows a private eye (Gosling) and a hired...

Patrick Burleigh and Will Widger (“Wish”) have signed on to write Ping Pong Diplomacy for Village Roadshow Pictures. Based on the book by Nicholas Griffin, the story centers on the 1971 Table Tennis World Championships in Japan, where the unlikely friendship between American player Glenn Cowan and top China player Zhuang Zedong set the media ablaze...

Comedy Central’s Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele have teamed with New Line Cinema to produce Keanu, a comedy about a group of friends posing as drug dealers in order to retrieve a stolen cat. Peter Atencio is in talks to direct from a script by Peele and Alex Rubens. The film is scheduled to start shooting next...

20th Century Fox has acquired Thrill Ride, an original idea for a teen horror comedy by Andrew J. Cohen & Brendan O’Brien (“Neighbors”). Cohen will direct and Peter Warren is set to write the screenplay. Set at a particularly cruel high school where bullying has become the norm, the story takes place at Senior Night, when...

Griffin Dunne (“The Accidental Husband”) has signed on to direct Married Sex, an adaptation of Jesse Kornbluth‘s new novel, for Chockstone Pictures. Kornbluth will write the screenplay, which will deal with the complexities of matrimony and the challenges, fantasies, and adventure it takes to keep a sex life alive.

Tom Welling has joined the cast of The Choice, the latest adaptation of a Nicholas Sparks novel. Directed by Ross Katz, the story is set in a small coastal town and follows neighbors Travis Parker (Benjamin Walker) and Gabby Holland (Teresa Palmer ), who end up pursuing a relationship neither expected. Welling will play Kevin McCarthy, a...

Giancarlo Esposito has joined the cast of The Maze Runner Chapter II: The Scorch Trials, the sequel to this fall’s hit. 20th Century Fox has announced that the second installment, also based on James Dashner’s novel, will be released on September 18, 2015. Director Wes Bell will return along with the lead actor, Dylan OBrien. Esposito...

Daniel Radcliffe is in talks to join the returning cast of Now You See Me 2, the sequel to last year’s hit. Jon M. Chu is set to direct with cast members Jesse Eisenberg, Isla Fisher, Morgan Freeman, Woody Harrelson, Dave Franco and Michael Caine returning. Radcliffe would play the son of Caine’s character.

Topher Grace has joined the cast of Truth, the true story drama about the CBS/Dan Rather scandal, that will star Robert Redford and Cate Blanchett. James Vanderbilt is making his feature film debut on the film that will tell the story behind CBS’ 60 Minutes II report that George W. Bush had gotten preferential treatment to...

Paramount has acquired US distribution rights for Richard Linklater’s That’s What I’m Talking About, a baseball comedy about an incoming freshman experiencing his first weekend in college as a pitcher on the school’s nationally ranked baseball team. Blake Jenner is set to play that role, with Tyler Hoechlin, Wyatt Russell, Ryan Guzman, Zoey Deutch, Will Brittain...

Keegan-Michael Key (TV’s “Key and Peele”) and Regina Hall (“Think Like a Man”) have joined the cast of the Vacation reboot. Ed Helms, Christina Applegate, Chris Hemsworth and Leslie Mann are starring in the new Griswold’s vacation adventure, that follows the grown-up son who has the perfect surprise for his wife, Debbie, and two sons: the...

Ann Dowd (TV’s “The Leftovers”) has joined the cast of Our Brand is Crisis, starring Sandra Bullock. The Warner Bros political dramedy, which focuses on the use of American political campaign strategies in South America, started filming recently.

Michael Pena is in talks to join the cast of The Martian, the sci-fi actioner that Ridley Scott is preparing to direct for 20th Century Fox. The screenplay, written by Drew Goddard, follows an astronaut who becomes stranded on Mars and must figure out how to stay alive long enough to get back home.

Universal Pictures has set Gary Dauberman (“Annabelle”) to write the screenplay for Crime of the Century, a sci-fi crime thriller that Dan Trachtenberg is attached to direct. The project has been in development at the studio since 2011 and is about “a group of thieves using time travel”. No plot details are known.

Bryan Cranston is in early talks to star in The Great Wall, the Chinese epic that Zhang Yimou has signed on to direct. Matt Damon is also in early talks to lead the cast, but he will need to work out scheduling conflicts, with The Martian and a potential new Bourne film, before he signs on.

Gary Whitta (“After Earth”) has signed on to write the adaptation of Starlight for 20th Century Fox. The comic book centers on space hero Duke McQueen, who saved the universe four decades ago but came back to Earth, where no one believed his fantastic stories. Years later, after he’s settled down and grown up, he’s recruited...

Director Fredrik Bond has left London Has Fallen, due to creative differences. Millennium Films is looking to hire another director in the next 72 hours, so that pre-production can remain as much as possible on schedule for the film to start shooting in six weeks. The sequel to Olympus Has Fallen stars Gerard Butler, Morgan Freeman,...

Thor Freudenthal (“Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters”) has signed on direct A Lion Called Christian for Sony Pictures. The inspirational drama is based on the true story of two friends who bought a lion cub from Harrods and raised it in their antique shop on King’s Road in the swinging 60’s London era. Eventually realizing the...

Arthur has found his Guinevere. Warner Bros has set Astrid Berges-Frisbey (“Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides”) to play the iconic role in Knights of the Roundtable: King Arthur, the new adaptation of the British legend. Charlie Hunman is already set to portray Arthur, with Idris Elba also starring. The film is part of a...

Matt Smith (from TV’s “Doctor Who”) has joined the ensemble of horror-comedy Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, which will star Lily James and Sam Riley. The long-in-the-works project is finally ready to start filming on September 24th.

Katherine Waterston and Patrick Fugit have joined the cast of Queen of Earth, a psychological thriller written and directed by Alex Ross Perry. The story centers on two friends who steal away to a beach house for a vacation. Although they grew up as best friends, they soon realize how disconnected from each other they have...

Margaret Qualley, who stars in the TV series “The Leftovers”, is in talks to join the cast of The Nice Guys, a noir drama that is set to star Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe. This will be Qualley’s first appearance in a studio film. Her film debut was 2013’s Palo Alto. The Nice Guys takes place...

Cara Delevingne has signed on to star in Paper Towns, an adaptation of John Green’s novel. Jake Schreier is directing for Fox 2000 Pictures. The story follows young neighbors who share the jarring experience of finding the body of a man who committed suicide. The two leads grow apart — until the night he finds her...

Ryan Guzman (“Step Up All In”) is the first actor announced for the ensemble of Richard Linklater’s baseball movie, That’s What I’m Talking About. Set in the 1980s, the story follows a college freshman who moves into a fraternity-like baseball house with his hard-partying teammates. Offers are out to Blake Jenner (Glee), Tyler Hoechlin (Teen Wolf)...

Luke Grimes (“Taken 2”) has joined the cast of Freeheld, a gay-rights drama starring Julianne Moore and Ellen Page. Based on the true story of New Jersey car mechanic Stacie Andree and her police detective girlfriend Laurel Hester, who both battled to secure Hester’s pension benefits after she was diagnosed with a terminal illness. James will...

Miranda Otto and Sam Neill have joined the cast of The Daughter, which stars Paul Schneider and Geoffrey Rush. The film is set in the last days of a dying logging town, where Christian (Schneider) returns to his family home for his father Henry’s (Rush) wedding. Reconnecting with his childhood friend Oliver and Oliver’s family, wife...

Paramount has emerged the winner of the bidding war for the worldwide rights to Chris Rock’s Top Five, paying $12.5 million — the biggest deal of the Toronto Film Festival. The comedy, that Chris Rock wrote, directed and starred in, is the story of New York City comedian-turned-film star Andre Allen, whose unexpected encounter with a...

Love & Mercy, the Brian Wilson biopic, will be released by Lionsgate and Roadside Attractions, after the distributors bought North American rights for the film for $3 million, at the Toronto Film Festival. Paul Dano and John Cusack play Brian Wilson at different ages, while Elizabeth Banks and Paul Giamatti also star in the drama which...

Albert Brooks has joined the cast of Sony’s untitled NFL concussion drama, that is set to star Will Smith. Gugu Mbatha-Raw (“Beyond the Lights”) is also in talks to join. The film is based on a GQ article by Jeanne Marie Laskas, which focused on Dr. Bennet Omalu, the forensic neuropathologist who single-handedly made the first...

Pierre Morel (“Taken”) has signed on to direct the first installment of a potential action franchise, based on Tom Wood’s Victor the Assassin books. Studio Canal has bought the rights to the six-book series and will produce with The Picture Company and Sentient Entertainment.

Justin Marks (“The Jungle Book”) has come on board to write a new draft for Top Gun 2, the sequel to the 1980s Tom Cruise hit. Peter Craig (“The Town”) had written the previous draft. Cruise is set to return as Maverick in a story about the relevance of good old fashioned pilots versus high-tech drones.

Universal Pictures has acquired a pitch from Chadwick Boseman (“Get on up”) and writing partner Logan Coles, that is described as a thriller in the vein of The Fugitive. Boseman intends to star in the film that will be produced by Marc Platt Productions.

William Hurt and Alice Braga have joined the case of the revenge thriller By Way of Helena, which Kieran Darcy-Smith is directing. Liam Hemsworth and Woody Harrelson star in the western, which is set in the 1880s and follows a Texas Ranger who investigates a series of unexplained deaths in a town called Helena. Filming starts...

Drew Barrymore has replaced Rachel Weisz in the friendship drama Miss You Already. She joins Toni Collette as long time friends whose relationship is put to the test when one starts a family and the other falls ill. The film starts starts filming in London this week, under the direction of Catherine Hardwicke.

Yaya DaCosta (“The Kids are Alright”) has joined the cast of Bolden!, a biopic of jazz musician Buddy Bolden, a New Orleans cornet player who was a key figure in the development of ragtime music. She will appear in new scenes about to be shot this month, for the ongoing production that started filming in 2010.

Warner Bros and Todd Phillips are in early talks with Jesse Eisenberg and Shia LaBeouf for them to play two stoners turned arms dealers in Arms & The Dudes. The project has been in development for several years, ever since producer Mark Gordon spotted the story in a Rolling Stones article. It tells the true story...

Jonathan Tropper (“This is where I leave you”) has signed on to direct The Priority List, based on David Menasche’s book. David Frankel is in talks to direct the inspiration drama for Warner Bros, which has Steve Carell attached to star as a terminally ill teacher who travels the world to reconnect with hundreds of his...

Andrés Muschietti (“Mama”) is set to direct Shadow of the Colossus for Sony Pictures. He will also oversee the script by Seth Lochhead (“Hanna”), which is based on the video game. Muschietti is taking over from Josh Trank who was previously attached to direct.

Jake Schreier (“Robot & Frank”) is set to direct Paper Town, an adaptation of the young adult novel by John Green. Nat Wolff (“The Fault in our Stars”) will star. Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber have written the screenplay. The film is scheduled to be released on July 31, 2015.